‘THERE WAS NOTHING ELSE LIKE IT’
LEGENDARY CLUB’S ORIGINAL DJS AND LEADING LIGHTS RECALL ITS GLORY DAYS
BACK on the evening of May 21, 1982, a Manchester icon was born. The Hacienda nightclub would open its doors for the first time at a vast old yacht warehouse on Whitworth Street West, and would go on to become the “epicentre” of the acid house and Madchester scene of the late 80s and 90s.
For those who raved there, it became one of the most important places on earth. For those who created, nurtured and controlled the operation of the club over its 15 years in the city, it would bring joy, frustration, elation and despair.
Now, 40 years on, many of those who were involved will be back to celebrate the club on the site of where the Hacienda was built at an anniversary rave in the car park of what is now the Hacienda Apartments. Original club DJs will play tracks over a mammoth eight-hour celebration which will also be streamed live across the world and raise funds for charity.
It has also been a time to reflect back on the extraordinary way the club came to be opened and operated here in the city - bankrolled by Manchester’s Factory Records and New Order. While the club opened up on May 21, 1982, it would not be until 1986 that it really began to take off, with events like DJ Mike Pickering’s legendary house night Nude filling the dancefloor and seeing clubbers queuing around the block.
It would witness the rise of the superstar DJ, with the likes of Jon DaSilva, Graeme Park, DJ Paulette, Tom Wainwright, Dave Haslam all becoming regulars that drew in the growing crowds flocking to Manchester at the heart of a cultural movement and moment in time. As Graeme Park puts it: “There was nothing else like it, you had this beautifully designed building by Ben Kelly with Peter Saville’s amazing artwork inside, everything came together.
“And yet it was the only place you didn’t have to worry about getting in, it didn’t matter what you were wearing. I played a lot of venues, but it was the first time I’d witnessed builders next to barristers, students next to teachers, professionals, unemployed, blue collar, white collar, all off them were there off their tits, dancing together, nobody gave a f***, that was the summer of love. Despite what the southern media might say, it was the north and the Hacienda that was the catalyst for the rave culture that spread around Britain and then around Europe.”
Despite its popularity and iconic status, the venue haemorrhaged money. A victim in no small part to the thousands ploughed in during the early days to start the club, with an initial budget of £50,000 swiftly escalating to £650,000 according to Factory Records co-founder Alan Erasmus.
Factory, being based on democratic principles, had voted on the plans for the club
- and while Rob Gretton, Tony Wilson and
Peter Saville had all voted in favour, Alan and music producer Martin Hannett had voted against, he says. But Alan, speaking about the Hacienda today, says: “For all the ups and downs I don’t regret it”.
Alan says: “I mean the place did look great, It was interesting, but it did distract from the creative aims of Factory, and it did absorb a hell of a lot of money. There was five or six years where it was just a money pit.
“It never made anything, and it had to be kept going because we were tied into a longish lease. I know that a lot of people out there went and had a brilliant time. I still have people coming up to me to say “you destroyed my life - I went to the Hacienda when I was 18 and nothing else has compared since”.
Alan, 73, adds: “I’ve not been to a club out there for a long time, but I doubt there will ever be anything like the Hacienda, or Factory, again, it was a unique creative platform. I know a lot of people had a brilliant time there, that cultural entertainment aspect of it, I can only sit back and applaud it for that.”
Ang Matthews was manager of the club when it hit its peak in the late 80s and remembers the sheer buzz around the Hacienda. She says: “When I got into work to open up there would be a queue around the block already and that would be at 7pm. They must have got changed at work and just stood there waiting for us to open.
“Within half an hour in the glory days the whole of the Hacienda would be full. All night I’d stay in the same place so that any incidents could be dealt with. I remember at the end of the night I’d be sick of the
sound of my name with people coming over saying “Ang, Ang” but hey, it was still the best job ever.”
New Order’s Peter Hook memorably recalled the financial woes of the club in his book on The Hacienda - sub-titled “How Not To Run A Club”. The band would plough in millions and millions of pounds of their musical profits into the club anything from £6m to £9m gets talked about as the sort of cash stumped up to keep the club afloat.
Looking back on it all now, Peter Hook, still can’t quite believe all the money that was spent on the venture. He says: “By the last two years we were subsidising it by £7k a month, and there looked to be no end in sight. It wasn’t just the financial side, it was the guns, the knives, stabbings, shootings it felt like every weekend. It was actually a relief when it went bankrupt at the end, although it was heartbreakingly sad.”
Hooky was just 26 when the Hacienda first opened. He recalls going on the opening night, when Manc comedian Bernard Manning was famously the compere.
Hooky says: “I went in on the opening night, I’d been down once to look at the build, but I didn’t feel a part of it. I got an invite through the post to go to the opening night to my own club.
“I was just like everybody else walking around - I didn’t think I’d paid for it all. I remember the only time being impressed was at the first birthday party, and was welcomed in by the then manager Ginger [Howard Jones], he used to be a promoter at the student unions. He welcomed me and Barney (New Order’s Bernard Sumner) at the door, took us down and said ‘look at this all of it’s for you’ so we piled into the free booze not realising we were paying for it - as well as everybody else’s free booze. That was the wanton recklessness of the Hacienda.”
Reflecting on the end of the Hacienda now, Hooky says “In a way having your own adult playground and being sort of revered for that, it was a heady feeling I didn’t want it to go. It was that weird position of realising how those mistakes at the start were insurmountable - Ben Kelly spending so much on the design, doing the deal we did with the brewery, it was all instrumental in making you earn nothing.
“Rob Gretton tried everything, he bought the building, on a mortgage with a ridiculous 18 per cent rate and they wouldn’t let us out of it, the whole thing was a nightmare.”
Rob died aged just 46 of a heart attack in 1999, while Tony died in 2007, aged 57. Hooky says that the revival of interest in the Hacienda as a club night and now the Hacienda Classical phenomenon, is a testament to what they achieved with the original superclub and the “greatest compliment” to Rob and Tony.
Original Hacienda DJs including Paulette Constable, Jon Da Silva, Graeme Park, Tom Wainwright and Hewan Clarke will all perform again on the night. DJ Paulette first began DJing at the Hac in 1991 at the now legendary Flesh night, the brainchild of the club’s promoter Paul Cons and Lucy Sher that became one of the most popular gay club nights in Europe.
Mancunian Paulette was known for her extraordinary club DJ outfits and her iconic performances, and became a trailblazer for women in the music industry. She says: “I’ve never talked about it that much, but I am really proud of it. I’m really proud of working for the Hacienda, it was one of the most iconic clubs that ever existed and always ahead of the curve.
“The Hacienda is now fully embracing the gay side of its history, the female side of its history, the black side of its history, they’re all coming into full focus, and it’s really beautiful. This is what all companies should be doing, this is what all society should be aiming for, just to see everybody, and hear everybody, accept everybody for the parts they played and the people they are, that’s what diversity and inclusion is about.
“But more that being involved with it now, it’s about embracing new technology, doing new things, we’re not just all about the nostalgia. If it was just ‘this is what it was like in the 90s,’ then I wouldn’t touch it. I’m a working DJ, I’m not interested in back in the day without a point. There’s nothing more boring than people saying “it was better in the 90s” but I say if we can bring a bit of the 90s into the 2020s and say this is the vibe what you going to do with it next, it’s magical. Its taking that idea and doing something new, and having a big f*** you at the end of it which was what it was all about.”
DJ Graeme Park says: “It’s really great, it’s still a privilege to be a part of it. 10 years ago at the 30th anniversary we’d started doing the occasional club night. But now we do the club nights here and overseas, and Hacienda Classical which was initially a crazy idea and a one-off, this year we have our sixth appearance at Castlefield Bowl, fifth at Albert Hall. We get people who weren’t even born when the Hacienda closed and they’re aware of our brand and our legacy, I sometimes can’t believe that it’s still a thing but I understand why.”
The Hacienda brand is now managed by Paul ‘Fletch’ Fletcher who says: “The impact the club and its founders’ philosophy has reverberated throughout the city and its people on so many levels, not only in Manchester but worldwide and its not to be underestimated. The Hacienda led the way in clubbing and culture as we know it, inspiring a generation and beyond, it was so much more then a club. I think Manchester would be a very different place without it and we should remember and pay homage to all those pioneers who created something very very special that is still felt today.”
Tickets for the “Fac51 The Hacienda 40 th Birthday Party Pt 1” have sold out. But the entire eight-hour event is to be broadcast live by StreamGM at www.StreamGM.co.uk and across their Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube platforms on Saturday, May 21 from 6pm.